


Love in Colour

by stardustintheirveins



Category: NINE PERCENT (Band), 偶像练习生 | Idol Producer (TV)
Genre: A lot of fluff I guess, Alternate Universe - College/University, I Tried, M/M, Multi, Polyamory, bestfriends!AU, implied boyfriends
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-03
Updated: 2018-07-31
Packaged: 2019-05-01 19:53:59
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,051
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14527980
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stardustintheirveins/pseuds/stardustintheirveins
Summary: Both felt like home. In their own way.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> All aboard the Zhengkunyi ship. This is my first time actually writing a poly ship and this is word vomit, in its purest form. 
> 
> Come scream at me on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/chengkunist)  
> or on [ cc ](https://curiouscat.me/xuchengist)

There was something so lethargic, so lazy about summer, like the days were drawn out and the earth simply forgot to spin faster, Zhengting thought as he rolled around on his bed. Or maybe it had to do with the fact that it was already the third day of his summer break and he still hadn't stepped out of the apartment. Granted, he had spent the whole first day nursing his hangover after the most chaotic night of the semester where a lot of questionable things went down but that was another whole story altogether.

He sighed, staring up the ceiling, counting the cracks. He could hear the slow whirring of the air conditioner above the window, the small creaks from the floor upstairs, footsteps right outside his door and then disappear slowly again. A little hope, a little excitement only to vanish the next moment. The apartment was quiet, the absence of his two flatmates too pronounced and Zhengting hated it. He shook his fist lazily at the ceiling, cursing the both of them for still having extra classes. Was it too late to regret his decision of staying back a month instead of going straight home?  
A stupid question to ask really because Zhengting knew all he wanted was to stay in this apartment with his two best friends, in their own little world forever. All of them were different and he couldn't count, even if he wanted to, the number of times he had to drag a drunk Xukun back to the dorms, a stumbling, giggling drunk Ziyi beside him nor the number of times he had to rush back to the apartment to Ziyi's distressed calls whenever he forgot the fact that there was no single bone in his body that knew how to cook. But the other two probably felt the same way- it was numerous-the times when they had to drop by college in the middle of the night with drinks and food to make sure their best friend wasn't going to die because his idiotic ass forgot about the basic necessities of life, too caught up in research. The three of them were flawed, greatly so but they adjusted. The other two always a safety net for the third to fall on. And they fell, pretty often. 

Chaos but ordered chaos. That's what they were. 

He glanced at his phone. 2 pm. No replies. No texts. No missed calls. He let out another long sigh, knowing he should get up and clean the apartment at least. But the silence, the absence, the sudden liberation made him too spaced out, the freedom too large for his small self to grasp. He longed for two other pairs of hands, two other people to keep him grounded. He rolled over again, this time to lie down on his stomach, leg waving lazily over the corner of the bed. Waiting, waiting, waiting. 

Zhengting woke up to the softest of kisses trailing down his back. And a small giggle followed by another pair of lips pressing kisses, this time along the curves of his shoulders. He closed his eyes and let out a small breath. 'Good evening, baby.' A little whine made its way out of his mouth. A moment later, he felt kisses on his nose, his eyelids, the shell of his ear and he laughed breathlessly, squirming under the soft attack. When he finally opened his eyes, he found both of his roommates propped up on their elbows-staring down at him.  
'Hey,' he murmured, hands coming up to settle on top of their heads.  
'Hey.' One voice deep, slow, gentle. The other a little bit higher, playful, lighter.  
One reminded him of the soft blue sky meeting the blue of the ocean, white curtains billowing in the sea breeze. The other reminded him of sunlight streaming in the early hours of the morning, sitting around the kitchen island, cups of morning coffee and tea. Both felt like home. In their own way. Zhengting could feel, at that moment, feelings of fondness bubbling up in his chest, threatening to spill over in waves and waves, enough to fill the whole city, the whole world.  
'I missed you.' His voice soft, a little bit of a quiver. His eyes big, blinking up at them, hoping the message got through. And both of them got reminded of butterflies fluttering across a bed of flowers, blue skies and unadulterated happiness, all the good things about summer. A lot like home. A lot like love.  
Five minutes later, Zhengting had both his arms around both boys, all of them nestled too closely on the queen-sized bed to be comfortable in the summer heat but they made do. They always did.


	2. Sudden Shower

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> His eyebrows shot up when ponytail guy automatically lifted up the other guy, legs winding around his waist, looking as if they had done this a million times before.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Based on [ this ](https://twitter.com/chengkunist/status/999394253045403648) tweet  
> Zhengkun who? Zikun who? Only Zhengkunyi
> 
> sort of a prequel i guess ?  
> Come scream at me on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/chengkunist)  
> or on [ cc ](https://curiouscat.me/xuchengist)
> 
> title taken from Yong JunHyung's Sudden Shower ♥

Flipping through his notes yet not registering anything that was scribbled onto the pages, Xukun willed the time to go faster so he could attend his last class for the day and go back to the dorms to catch up on much-needed sleep. Normally, he would be hanging out with his friends but it was the beginning of the first semester in university and he didn't think 'the guy who sat beside him in economics class and exchanged glances with whenever the professor went on a tangent' counted as 'friends' so here he was- alone, bored and sweaty, a pitiful example of a closed up first-year student really-

'Wang Ziyi!' a loud, shrill shout echoed across the nearly empty quad and Xukun looked up just in time to see a boy with one of the most radiant smiles he had ever seen in his life run across the common space to fling himself at another guy, taller, with a ponytail that was by far the nicest Xukun had seen among his peers. His eyebrows shot up when ponytail guy, without any moment's hesitation, automatically lifted up the other guy, long legs winding around his waist- a feat done with an ease telling that this was most probably a frequent thing. He half expected them to make out in front of him (and the five other heads all turned towards them) but nothing of the sort happened. Rather, the two guys were laughing, and if Xukun thought the smile he had glimpsed before was radiant, the other boy was now practically glowing- big hand movements as he chattered on. Ponytail guy had his arm casually slung around the smaller one's shoulder-the gentlest of smiles on his face that reminded Xukun of the paintings hanging on the walls of the chapel back home, as he kept on nodding and agreeing to whatever the shorter one was saying.  
And maybe it had to do with the fact that his best friend was now across the world or it may have been because university was a lot harder than he had expected, the classes too heavy and leaving him drained at the end of each day, missing company that could share his woos or maybe it was because the two boys had seemed so comfortable with each other, the ease and familiarity between the pair so apparent to anyone with two eyes that even after he dropped his bag on the bed in his dorm after classes, Xukun still couldn't get his mind off them- ponytail guy and radiant guy.


	3. Starlight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a piggyback

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so i come back with word vomit and a zhengyi piggyback

The second time Xukun sees them together, it's way past college hours. The sky has already turned a dark blue, remnants of the day fading into twilight and he's lounging on the bench outside his dormitory, hands fiddling with his phone.  
'Zhengting, stop squirming.' A soft voice breaks the silence and Xukun looks up to see the 'couple'- 'radiant smile guy' plopped onto the back of the ponytail guy - except today his hair is in loose waves framing his face making Xukun wonder idly what shampoo he used. A soft giggle interrupts his train of thought and he glances over to see a flushed cheek pressed against a white shirt, eyes closed and a small smile making all the sharp features look unbearably soft.  
'You seriously need to stop being so competitive and trying to beat Yanchen in drinking,' Ziyi reprimands Zhengting who just pouts in return and Xukun should stop staring like a creep before they catch him and label him as a weirdo and then he'll lose all his chances of ever getting to know them properly. But under the streetlight the two figures look so interesting and sweet, especially with the lingering homesickness and nostalgia of high school in the air, he watches them fade away into the distance before he's startled by his phone ringing. And maybe he can't deny the fact that he spends the next half hour with the image of a piggyback stuck on the back of his eyelids and wondering if one day, he'll get to call or look at someone with the same tenderness he had seen between them.


	4. Through the Night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> maybe this isn't the home he misses but it's home all the same

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so someone's semester started again but zhengyikun (and homesickness) don't know a heavy workload or pending assignments!  
> proof-read who?  
> title taken from IU's song

Xukun is sure if he closes his eyes or even blinks, the tears will start to fall so he doesn’t. He doesn’t until his eyes become red and they unwillingly fall shut and just like he predicts, the dam opens and soon he’s a sobbing mess, a lonely, willowy figure hunched over visible in the light cast by the overhead streetlight. He can remember the look on his mother’s face as she turned around to enter the car that would take her away to the airport and to his hometown a few hundred, thousand miles away. It isn’t like they aren’t used to the long distance, to the long periods of absence but this time it’s a bit different. This time, they had grown closer, had grown to tell each other secrets, confide in the littlest of details, some quirks, some small incidents that had put a smile on their faces, or made frowns appear and it would be a lie to say they hadn’t been close before but it had been more of a comfortable mom-son relationship where things were kept at bay, all in well-meaning attempts of not worrying the other but this time, Xukun thinks, was wholly different. This time, he had managed to see his mom as how her friends saw her - a young woman who had her worries and her interests, how she could never manage to keep her laughter at bay, how she hated talking to her aunt and uncle because she felt they had never appreciated her decision taking care of him by herself, her worries over not being enough, her love for the morning markets, how she loved travelling even though she hardly had time for it- He looks up at the night sky, at the hazy layer of pollution that covers the stars he wishes he could see and tries hard to stop the tears from welling up. He wishes he can go back in time or go forward six months even though he knows the new semester will be a good one, one with countless number of precious memories to keep but he can’t help it when the longing and the loneliness is still too fresh. He somehow stumbles back to the apartment and into his room and onto his bed. Just as his mind starts to delve into bad places again after staring into the darkness, he feels the bed dip under another weight and once more on the other side and soon, he’s sobbing into a shirt as gentle hands cradle his head while a pair of lips leave soft kisses on the crown, two soft voices whispering it’s okay kun-kun, it’s okay, cry all you want into his ears, into his heart and somehow making it all better, somehow making the waves stop till it's just gentle ones lapping on the surface. He takes a deep breath, his throat parched and his nose and eyes pinched, a small shaky breathy chuckle leaving his mouth, making two other throats close up in worry, in shared sadness for the youngest.  
‘Thank you,’ he says, hands coming up to clasp at thin air until he reaches two bodies and in the dark, in the small cramped bed, he finds comfort in his two boyfriends and their quiet presence and he falls asleep to the thought that this isn't the home he misses but it's home all the same.


End file.
